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According to the account given in the Bible's Gospel of John, Judas Iscariot carried the disciples' money bag.[4]

During the Roman era, the Legio IV Scythica was camped in Zeugma, an ancient city of Commagen (modern-day Turkey). Excavations carried out in the city revealed 65,000 seal imprints (in clay, known as “Bulla”) found in a place which is believed to serve as the archives for the customs of ancient Zeugma. The seal imprints used in sealing papyrus, parchment, moneybags, and customs bales are good indication of volume of the trade and the density of transportation and communication network once established in the region.

Charon's obol, a death custom originating in ancient Greece whereby a coin is placed with a corpse, in the 3rd-4th century AD in Western Europe, were often found in pouches, making them money pouches. From the Middle Ages to around 1900, Rottweiler dogs were used by travelling butchers at markets to guard money pouches tied around their necks.[5]

Beginning in the 14th century, purses of money (panakizhi) were awarded to scholars during the Revathi Pattathanam, an annual assembly of scholars held in Kerala, India. In 16th century feudal Japan, samurai wore uchi-bukuro (money purses) around the waist or neck.

In 1620, pediatric tracheotomy was unheard of until a boy tried to hide a bag of gold by swallowing it. It became lodged in his esophagus and blocked his trachea. The tracheotomy allowed the surgeon to manipulate the bag and it to pass through his system.[6] In September 1864, Rose O'Neal Greenhow, a Confederate agent, drowned with a bag of gold around her neck after leaving the Condor (a British blockade runner ship) in a boat.

A wealthy person can have the nickname "moneybag" (or "moneybags").[7][8]Marcus Licinius Crassus (c. 115-53 BC), a leading Roman politician in his day, was known in Rome as Dives, meaning "The Rich" or "Moneybags". Ivan I of Moscow ("Ivan the Moneybag") was a Russian "Grand Prince of Moscow" from 1328-1341 who was famous for being generous with his wealth. American Cardinal Francis Spellman (1889–1967) was sometimes called "Cardinal Moneybags" in his later life, while Chicago mobster and racketeer Murray Humphreys (1899–1965) was referred to as "Mr. Moneybags" by his friends. Miss Moneybags (played by Edna Purviance) is a fictional character in the 1915 Charlie Chaplin silent comedy film The Count. James Edward "Baron of Edgerton" Hanson's (1922–2004) billion-dollar empire earned him the nickname "Lord Moneybags". Another fictional character, Victor Newman (Eric Braeden) of The Young and the Restless soap opera, has also been called "Moneybags".

In the 16th century, The Conjurer, a painting by Hieronymus Bosch, features a child stealing a money purse from a bespectacled character.

In A new way to pay the National Debt (1786), James Gillray caricatured King George III and Queen Charlotte awash with treasury funds to cover royal debts, with William Pitt handing him another moneybag.